iPad rumors running wild

John Gruber goes long on the rumored iPad Junior:

Last month I tried to think this smaller iPad thing all the way through. Didn’t quite make it all the way through, though, so let’s dig deeper.

We’ve got the display. 7.85 inches diagonally, 1024 × 768 pixels at 163 PPI — the same pixels-per-inch density as the pre-retina iPhones and iPod Touch. With the same 4:3 aspect ratio and 1024 × 768 pixel dimensions, it should look to iPad software exactly like an iPad 1 or 2 display — everything will just render a little smaller, but not too much smaller.

But then what would the device look like, as a whole? One obvious answer would be that it would look exactly like an iPad 2 but smaller, like it was hit by a shrink ray. Our friends at Gizmodo commissioned an artist to create mockups based on this assumption, and the result certainly looks plausible.

But I’d wager heavily that Gizmodo guessed wrong.

Click through to read John's best guess at what this thing is going to look and feel like.  Add a retina display (next year) and this will be the iPad I've always wanted. And, if I had to guess, the iPad Apple has always wanted, too.